To postpone trip abroad due to flight chaos?

[Sunorstayome]

Meant to be going away for a short but pricey birthday celebration to Madrid-flying BA next Friday.
I’m worried at all the flight cancellations and at the moment have the option to rebook but will lose this if I delay. It’s only a 3 day break but an important holiday and I don’t want our precious time away to be cut short with delays (not to mention the cost of accommodation and flights).
Does anyone have useful information?
thank you

What airport are you flying from? Neighbours went from Heathrow the other day and whizzed through, no delays at all. I'd still go personally.

Gatwick

Haven't actually seen any bad reports about Gatwick...just people raging at Manchester and Birmingham.

We flew from Gatwick over the Jubilee weekend and it was a breeze, no problems at all. I certainly wouldn’t be cancelling my holiday out of fear.

Gatwick has had a share of cancellations but it is easing now half term is over. Travelled through North a few weeks ago and Security was fine.

I'm in exactly the same position, flying to a European city next Fri, from Manchester! I'm not cancelling. Looking at the last 5 days of live departures, every flight to my destination has set off with a maximum 2 hour delay. I can live with that! Can you check the Gatwick departures?

Summersdreaming Good idea!

I've been checking flightstats.com it's easy to filter to what you want to see. Enjoy Madrid!

I flew from Heathrow over the Jubilee weekend and it took 20 minutes to get through security.

I've no idea what it might be like in Madrid, though. We flew back from Copenhagen and had long waits for security and for passport control (the latter would have been a bit shorter if we'd still been in the EU, but not much).

Oh just seen you are going from Gatwick. Friends also went to CPH last weekend, but they flew from Gatwick and they didn't mention they'd had problems.

I've been to three different European destinations in the last two weeks and all were fine overall. Flights out delayed by 1-2 hours but no problems getting through the airports at either end of the trips. From Manchester, afternoon flights.

So go, be prepared you might be in queues for a while or get delayed but if you expect it then it won't stress you out as much. Will be worth it for a bit of sun! And it isn't going to get much better any time soon so best to get on with life!

Hi Op - If I were you, I'd use an app/website like Flight Aware to see if BA has recent form for cancelling that flight number. I'd make a decision based on the outcome.

My niece flew out from Gatwick this week to one of the Spanish islands and had no problems at all. (Caveat - she didn't go with BA or EasyJet).

I hope you're able to enjoy your holiday

I went to Madrid over the bank holiday, all was fine getting there.
The queues at passport control for non EU citizens in Madrid were really long, about 45 minutes to an hour so allow time for that.
If you're planning on using public transport the tube line from the airport has some renovation work which is a bit of a pain but there is a set airport rate with the white taxis, pretty reasonable, and there are also buses or the Cercanias commuter line.
It's a beautiful city, hope you have a great time.

I flew through Gatwick a couple of weeks ago and we purchased the fast/express passes for about €8 and went straight through. The other check in line was approx an hour at the time

I've flown Birmingham recently .. absolutely fine ! Busy but all moving !
Go and enjoy your break 💐

We flew to Bilbao very recently from Gatwick and it was probably the easiest flight I’ve ever taken. Our flight home was cancelled but we had a few days’ notice and we just booked onto another flight with no difficulty at all. Another extremely easy flight.

Be prepared to have your Covid passport ready on arrival- we weren’t allowed into the airport terminal until it had been checked.

Have fun.